The Every-day Book and Table Book, v. 1 (of 3): or Everlasting Calendar of Popular Amusements, Sports, Pastimes, Ceremonies, Manners, Customs and Events, Incident to Each of the Three Hundred and Sixty-five Days, in past and Present Times; Forming a Complete History of the Year, Month, and Seasons, and a Perpetual Key to the AlmanacHone, William
History
The Every-day Book and Table Book, v. 1 (of 3): or Everlasting Calendar of Popular Amusements, Sports, Pastimes, Ceremonies, Manners, Customs and Events, Incident to Each of the Three Hundred and Sixty-five Days, in past and Present Times; Forming a Complete History of the Year, Month, and Seasons, and a Perpetual Key to the Almanac
Hone, William
Days; Great Britain -- Social life and customs
St. Athanasius, or rather the life of St. Anthony before alluded to,
which, notwithstanding Butler’s authorities, may be doubted as the
product of Athanasius; but, however that may be, that memoir of St.
Anthony is very particular in its account of St. Anthony’s warfare with
the infernal powers. It says that hostilities commenced when the saint
first determined on hermitizing; “in short, the devil raised a great
deal of dust in his thoughts, that by bemudding and disordering his
intellects he might make St. Anthony let go his design.” In his first
conflict with the devil he was victorious, although satan appeared to
him in an alluring shape. Next he came in the form of a black boy, and
was again defeated. After that Anthony got into a tomb and shut down the
top, but the devil found him out, and, with a great company of other
devils, so beat and bruised him, that in the morning he was discovered
by the person who brought his bread, lying like a dead man on the
ground; whereupon he took him up and carried him to the town church,
where many of his friends sat by him until midnight. Anthony then coming
to himself and seeing all asleep, caused the person who brought him
thither to carry him back privately, and again got into the tomb,
shutting down the tomb-top as before. Upon this, the devils being very
much exasperated, one night, made a noise so dreadful, that the walls
shook. “They transformed themselves into the shapes of all sorts of
beasts, lions, bears, leopards, bulls, serpents, asps, scorpions and
wolves; every one of which moved and acted agreeably to the creatures
which they represented; the lion roaring and seeming to make towards
him, the bull to butt, the serpent to creep, and the wolf to run at him,
and so in short all the rest; so that Anthony was tortured and mangled
by them so grievously that his bodily pain was greater than before.”
But, as it were laughingly, he taunted them, and the devils gnashed
their teeth. This continued till the roof of his cell opened, a beam of
light shot down, the devils became speechless, Anthony’s pain ceased,
and the roof closed again. At one time the devil laid the semblance of a
large piece of plate in his way, but Anthony, perceiving the devil in
the dish, chid it, and the plate disappeared. At another time he saw a
quantity of real gold on the ground, and to show the devil “that he did
not value money, he leaped over it as a man in a fright over a fire.”
Having secluded himself in an empty castle, some of his acquaintance
came often to see him, but in vain; he would not let them enter, and
they remained whole days and nights listening to a tumultuous rout of
devils bawling and wailing within. He lived in that state for twenty
years, never seeing or being seen by any one, till his friends broke
open the door, and “the spectators were in amazement to see his body
that had been so belaboured by devils, in the same shape in which it was
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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